


kind of romantic

by zauberer_sirin



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, First Time, Fluff, Future Fic, Unresolved Sexual Tension, almost dying together, on the field together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-24
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-09-11 15:50:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8997166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/pseuds/zauberer_sirin
Summary: This time, Daisy is sure. This time they're not getting out of here.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hamsterfactor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hamsterfactor/gifts).



Coulson has gone quiet, which is not a good sign. But Daisy is too busy trying to keep him up, to keep him walking, dragging him on, if necessary, to think what his gloomy mood means right now. She can hear steps above them, whatever is left of this group of Watchdogs scrambling to find them

He is not a big man, but she is all too aware of his body right now, since she is carrying his whole weight at the moment, helping him up with one arm looped around his back. His knee is busted, from trying to keep a Watchdog away while Daisy completed the mission. Now she can feel his labored breathing under the palm of her hand as she holds him and pushes him forwards, which means he didn’t only received the blows on his leg.

Daisy, she is more tired than hurt. Not just tired, hollowed out.

She closes her eyes for a moment, trying to feel the vibrations of their pursuers near, but all she can feel is Coulson struggling to breath in and then struggling to breath out. She has to stop for a moment, leaning Coulson against a wall (he winces when she lets her go).

“I can’t use my powers anymore,” she says, panting just as much.

“You pushed yourself too hard,” Coulson tells her, his voice soft.

She smiles. “Look who’s talking.”

“Yeah,” he says, returning the adrenaline-fueled, desperate smirk.

“It had to be done,” Daisy says, telling herself, in case they don’t make it, knowing she had no other choice.

Coulson nods.

She tries advancing, but she swears her fellow agent is getting heavier and heavier by the second. Her legs and shoulders hurt. She knows they will soon give out.

This time it’s Coulson the one to hear their assailants nearby first.

“We need cover,” he says.

“We need to _hide_ ,” Daisy tells him, between her teeth, fingers aching with the frustration of powerlessness.

If not hide, because that’s impossible, somewhere they can finish catching their breath.

They soon find an empty room, or room-closet, somewhere small and isolated, to keep out of enemy fire. Daisy is not one for calculating the odds - her odds have always been very bad, if she had calculated she’d have often been paralyzed - but she can’t ignore how bad they are this time. It also doesn’t matter.  
She locks the door behind them, her and Coulson promptly falling to their knees. Or rather, Daisy falls to her knees and Coulson, not having the support that has allowed him to make it this far, follows her down.

“We did it, though,” Daisy says, because that’s what matters. “They won’t be able to hurt any more Inhumans with that machine.”

Coulson reaches out, taking her hand in his.

Daisy is not sure why the gesture, but looks down between them, at their fingers entwined. Their hands are dirty from the fight - which says it all really.

“Coulson-” she starts, but she has no idea how to finish. She doesn’t. She lets the thought die out.

She doesn’t need her powers to become aware of the growing commotion outside the door. Coulson has noticed as well, subtly wincing with every noise approaching.

“Well, I think this is it,” Daisy says, clenching her other fist, a gallows humor smile but ready to fight until the very end.

Coulson stares at her in a peculiar way.

“Don’t say that,” he says, softly, as if he couldn’t bear thinking of her dying.

Well, Daisy thinks, she can’t bear thinking of _him dying_ , she never could, even though he did it once and she had to listen to that in great detail.

She smiles at him.

“You are a romantic guy, aren’t you?” she says, squeezing his hand. “You know what dying together means.”

“Daisy-”

The door is forced open.

For a moment Daisy thinks they are going to die, she is convinced that Coulson saying her name is the last thing she is ever going to hear. It’s not that bad, if you think about it like that.

“So here you were,” comes YoYo’s voice instead. 

Daisy looks up. YoYo is already calling Mack on the radio. she has a gun in her hand, which is unusual - YoYo prefers to use her powers, but she has also gone through SHIELD training once she went from asset to fully-fledged agent this year. Daisy can only stare dumbly at her, their unexpected savior. Her hand still clutched to Coulson’s, fingers digging into each other’s palms.

“Come on,” YoYo is saying now, gesturing with impatience. “No time for you to play escondite.”

Daisy nods and turns to Coulson and remembers.

“He’s hurt,” she tells YoYo. “He needs help.”

YoYo gets to it, slipping her arm under Coulson’s shoulder while Daisy does the same on the left side. With some difficulty - Daisy is not 100% herself here - they manage to lift him into an upright position, YoYo leading the way out of the damn building.

They survive.

That’s what they’re good at, isn’t it?

 

+

 

In the Quinjet she can’t look at his face.

Mack is tending to his leg with a concerned frown in his face, Coulson is going to need proper patching-up when they get back to base.

She is not sure what happened back there in that building. Except that something happened.

Daisy is not used to thinking about her own death; she knows she does a ton of stuff that might get her killed, but it’s stuff that has to be done so… what’s the use of thinking about it? She knows she won’t live to a ripe old age and to be honest, there aren’t that many things about her life that make her think that’s going to be such a great tragedy.

But back in that room… the idea of dying did feel like a tragedy. For the first time ever, maybe. It had felt like a _waste_.

And surviving, just surviving, it doesn’t feel much better.

She looks down at her hand, the one Coulson had reached out for and held so tightly, without any explanation for why he was doing that.

She looks down at her hand and wonders exactly what she feels it would be wasted.

 

+

 

She comes by right as he is discharged from the medbay -or rather as he is forcing his doctors to discharge him, as he is finishing getting dressed again. She is not sure why she needed to see Coulson again before the day was over, but she’s relief that he hasn’t left just yet.

“How are your powers?” he asks as soon as he sees Daisy.

She passes her hand over the bedside table, making a few objects rattle on their metal tray. Coulson smiles, relieved.

“You were worried I had lost them forever?” She wants to tease him, but that machine was no joke. She shakes her head. “Yeah, I was worried too.”

“I’m glad,” he says.

He says it in a voice that makes Daisy think maybe he knows how much she loves her powers, how losing them would be like losing a limb (perhaps not the best choice of words here, Daisy). Everybody appreciates them, because they help save the day, but not everybody realizes they are something to be loved, too.

Coulson finishes buttoning his shirt and tentatively he gets down from the gurney.

“And hey. Seems like you are not going to die, after all.”

“I’m still going to need some help to get to my bunk,” he says. “Do you mind?”

“Of course. I mean, of course I don’t.”

She’s embarrassed, he seems calm. “Thank you,” he says, and waits for Daisy to offer her shoulder.

Now that she is rested, it’s easier, helping him up like this. It makes her more aware of his body that back in the building. Again, he’s not a big man, and even though he is a very capable, very fit SHIELD agent, Daisy has always thought of him as fragile. Not because he’s old or anything - but, she realizes, because she has always been scared of him getting hurt. He seems more fragile than he really is, because Daisy doesn’t want anything bad to happen to him. But that might be unfair. He’s not helpless, precisely, today had proven as much.

“You know you kicked ass back there, don’t you?” she says, as they walk on together.

“I just helped out, you did all the hard work.”

“No, you were ama- you were great. I mean it.”

Coulson nods slowly, like conceding a hard fought point.

“Thank you,” he says. “I was just trying to catch up to you.”

They advance slowly and Daisy is thinking how this is the second time she does this today, hold him up while she helps him walk, one arm around his back, one hand on his stomach, to catch him. Though this time, at least, no one is after them to kill them.

It’s odd that he asked her to help this time, though, that he asked her to walk with him to his room. Uncharacteristic. She wonders if there’s something wrong.

“I don’t know if I am,” Coulson says, and it’s been so long since neither of them say anything that Daisy doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

“What?”

“A romantic guy, I don’t think I am one,” he says, wistfully. “I used to pretend I was. I even believed it. But I don’t think I’ve ever been.”

Daisy shrugs very slightly (she is carrying his weight on one of her shoulders, after all), looking at the hallways head. She thinks about how he sleeps in a different part of the base, now that he had to give up the Director’s quarters.

“That’s fine. I’m not a romantic girl.”

Silence falls between them for the rest of the short walk. Daisy knows she should probably follow that up - but she is scared. In a day when she has been so scared of dying, this seems like a lot more daunting.

Then they are already at the door to his quarters.

“Thank you for escorting me,” he says, and chuckles at the stiff expression.

“That’s all right.”

He extricates himself from her arms, turning to face her.

Daisy can see it in his face, that he is about to say good night, and the day would draw to a close.

What a waste, she thinks, and suddenly her hands are on his shoulders, curling around them, and she is pushing Coulson against the wall, careful with his injury but firm. Hard. Her mouth hard on his, too, catching his lips with hers.

Coulson reacts faster than she had imagined, kissing her back, one arm loosely around her back. A surprised and pleased moan dies in his throat as he realizes what is going on and becomes an equal participant, but Daisy still pushes him harder, wanting to keep the initiative. He lets her.

She drops her hands to his waist, as if she wanted to hold him in place. Not that he could go anywhere with that knee of his, Daisy thinks as she kisses him, and it makes her feel a wave of protectiveness - the kiss slows down, it becomes tender and careful and deeper. She is only vaguely aware of being in a public corner of the base, but she is only aware of how little she cares. Though not technically breaking protocol, she is also aware this violates international laws in a way. Who knew kissing Coulson would be an act of rebellion. She smiles against him - fitting. 

When she lets him go Coulson’s lips look a ridiculous dark shade of pink, and it makes Daisy lick her own.

He leans back against the wall, her hands still wrapped around his hips.

“That was pretty romantic,” he tells her, his smile a bit smug.

“Yeah?”

He nods.

Daisy passes her hand over her face.

“We’re both pathetic,” she whispers.

Coulson puts one finger under her chin, a gesture that reminds her of old movies, a gesture that seems more tender than anyone has ever touched her with.

“Why do you say that?” he asks her.

She is a bit angry at them, if she’s honestly.

“To think that we were going to die… that’s what it took for us to do this! We should have…”

She trails off, thinking of waste, wasted time, wasted emotions. Waste waste waste. She can’t bear to think about it.

Coulson doesn’t seem to be angry, though. He takes her face in his hands and kisses her lovingly, once, twice, almost chaste, but not quite.

“Do you want to come in?” he asks Daisy.

And she takes a moment, and important moment, and she nods, solemnly, letting Coulson know how much she means it and how he has to mean it too, this has to mean something. It already means so much to her, and she is so glad they didn’t die. 

_Now_ she knows what a waste that would have been.

 

+

 

“Daisy.”

She can’t seem to get used to the many variations of how he says her name.

This time it might mean he is overwhelmed by how beautiful she is, now that he sees her naked - or at least that’s what _Daisy hopes_ this “Daisy” means. She doesn’t have the greatest self-confidence, so something like that would be nice.

It’s not that, though. He gives his leg a questioning look, his bandaged knee the only part of him hidden from her.

“Oh,” Daisy realizes. “We can work our way around it.”

She tries straddling him, getting on top.

Nope. He’s in pain.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“You don’t need to apologize,” she tells him.

“But I want to…” looking in a different sort of pain. “I _really_ want to.”

Daisy chuckles at his boyish impatience, uncharacteristic. She feels flattered in a way that makes the back of her ears go hot, all of the sudden.

“I believe you,” she says, gesturing towards his fully-fledged arousal.

It’s strange, and liberating, to be talking to Coulson about something this intimate. He has been the person closest to her for years, yet their conversation had always stopped some steps before the truly personal. Now she’s easily talking about his hard-on. Which she has caused. It’s exhilarating to say the least. Coulson always seems so in control…

That gives her an idea.

“Can you lie on your side?”

“I think so. Let me try.”

She does the same and suddenly they are face to face. The bed is a bit less crowded now, but they slide closer together, as if the extra room was making them lonely. The room itself looks so lonely, so bare, because he never uses it, he’s always sleeping on the plane. 

“Hi,” Daisy says as they settle on their sides, kissing him before he can react.

She touches him lightly, minding his bad leg, but also enjoying the moment. Coulson takes the hint, drawing his hand between their bodies as well. Daisy bites her lip, his, trying not to moan too loud.

“You’re beautiful,” Coulson whispers against her neck, as his thumb drops from her ribcage to her hip.

But Daisy can still feel his frustration at not being able to move as much as he wants.

“We don’t have to do everything tonight,” she reassures him - in fact, she finds it quite exciting, having something to look forward too, when his injury gets better. She’s been too much in a hurry with all her lovers before tonight.

“But I want to do everything to you,” Coulson argues, his voice sharp with want. Daisy suspects for him this is what’s a novelty, not being able to take it slow. “And I want you to do everything to me.”

Daisy swallows. His words sound strangely hot to her. Make her wish she had pushed Coulson against a wall and kissed him _years_ ago.

She smiles fondly. “Okay, but we can do that some other time.”

Coulson pouts a bit. 

“I guess so,” he says with humor, brushing his nose against her cheek.

He’s funny. She loves him. Kind of late in the game to realize just now.

“What?” he asks, because Daisy has made a face. 

“It’s a secret,” she says.

She wants to be funny and playful too.

Afterwards they rest on their backs again, the bed becoming smaller, but their bodies closer, which is good. Daisy finds it weird that she was thinking about how she was maybe possibly going to die some hours early, because she’s never felt more… well, not dying.

She listens to Coulson’s breathing evening it out, feels like she has been listening to his breathing the whole day, but now it makes her feel comforted, not fearful. Her powers at full battery again, she can feel every change in the vibrations of his body, he couldn’t hide anything from her right now.

“I’ve changed my mind,” he says when Daisy is sure he is about to fall asleep.

“About what?”

He brushes his lips against the curve of Daisy’s shoulder, a sort of ghost kiss that makes her toes curl. 

“I think I am a romantic, after all.”

Daisy grins to herself, to the ceiling.

“Me too.”


End file.
